Family, players fuel Les Miles' decision to stay at LSU

BATON ROUGE -- Surprisingly, there are no statues of athletic figures on the LSU campus.

Matthew Hinton/The Times-PicayuneLSU Coach Les Miles said Wednesday: 'I really enjoy representing the people who represent this program.'

Les Miles has another structure in mind, though: cementing the Tigers' legacy as a powerhouse football program, which already has a strong foundation.

"I can see us building a building here," Miles said as he announced that he has agreed in principle to a seven-year contract at LSU. "This is fun place to coach, and the opportunity is always here for LSU to compete for the national championship. We have great players, teams that look forward to winning -- and I'm looking forward doing that here for quite some time."

The extension, the terms of which haven't been finalized, doesn't increase Miles' guaranteed annual income of $3.751 million -- but it includes bonuses for championships and bowl victories.

Miles said Tuesday after meeting the day before with officials from Michigan, his alma mater, that he will remain at LSU. The extension provides security in case the Tigers slip from their present status. They were No. 8 in The Associated Press and coaches' polls after going 11-2 this season, and they will likely go into the 2011 season with a top-five ranking.

Miles has a 62-17 record in six seasons with the Tigers, including a BCS championship in the 2007 season.

That's a contrast to the atmosphere after the 2008 and 2009 seasons, when Athletic Director Joe Alleva didn't roll over Miles' contact after 8-5 and 9-4 campaigns.

In the hypercompetitive world of college football -- especially in the Southeastern Conference, which has produced five consecutive national championship teams -- that's reassuring.

"In the wrong year you can have issues with eligibility and injuries and losses to graduation -- all of those things which are reasons that you lose games," said Miles, whose current contract runs though 2014. "Now no one is happy with a seven-win season, and nobody is happy here unless you win a championship. But there is always the reality that you can't win them all.

"But when you're in a place like this, we should be position to compete for a championship every year, and if not, be in position to fix why we weren't."

For Miles, 57, the extension should mean this is the final stop of his coaching career.

Miles, as he tends to do, didn't exactly say that Wednesday, but left the impression that he now views what he has done and can do at LSU his ultimate coaching accomplishments -- not what might have been at Michigan.

"Six years ago, I didn't know what I was getting into," he said. "Now, six years later, I really, really have enjoyed that ride -- and I want that to continue. I really enjoy representing the people who represent this program."

That, he added, especially hit home during the Tigers' 41-24 victory against Texas A&M in the Cotton Bowl this past Friday night in Arlington, Texas.

"I don't know if there has even been a greater charge than taking the field in the Cotton Bowl and coming off with a victory against a grand old program on national TV," he said. "I don't know what vacations I could take consecutively that would give me the thrill in coaching that game."

Miles indicated that what might get him out of coaching early would be the football careers of sons, Manny, 14 and Ben, 12.

His daughter, Smacker, 16, is an elite swimmer who is transferring from University High to a sports academy this spring in Jacksonville, Fla.

"If the boys are playing, I would think I want to be there," Miles said.

Of course, there's now a good chance that when it comes time for the Miles' sons to be recruited, their father will still be at LSU.

"It's much easier to build a program than it is to sustain a program," Alleva said. "We're in a sustain mode now. If you look at the great coaches in history, they're the ones who built their programs and sustained them. Les has built and sustained this program, and that is what we are going to do for the next years and hopefully beyond that."

Expectations for the Tigers will be sky high for the 2011 season, which begins where the last one ended -- at Cowboys Stadium (this time the opponent will be Oregon, who fell to Auburn in the BCS title game Monday night).

"We're fired up," LSU junior quarterback Jordan Jefferson. "Oregon will be at least No. 2 in the country, so that game alone could define our whole year. We didn't get to play for the national championship this year, but our plan is to get there next year."

It was during Cotton Bowl week, with the intrigue over the Michigan job increasing daily, Miles said, that he realized how much he wanted to be at LSU.

"This was so much like our national championship year, and the team was so much like the championship team," he said. "It will be a great memory of our time here, the season, the game and the opponent. Playing in a game like that is a joy. And then when you get into the Southeastern Conference and line up our opponents, they're standing tall, too."

Jefferson said the players noticed it, too.

"Coach has been energized the whole season," he said. "Practices have been very intense, but that was because he wanted make sure we worked hard -- and he got the most out of us. You could just see that passion and desire he has to be with the team through the whole week."

Jefferson pointed out that coaching is a business, and the Tigers were cognizant that Miles might leave for Ann Arbor, Mich.

Miles acknowledged that was possible, although neither he nor anyone at Michigan has said there was an actual offer made.

"I would not have met with Michigan without the potential of a different outcome," he said. "In your waking hours, and at 4 a.m. in the morning, talking with your wife or driving home from the office, there are those moments when you put it in line and structure the decision. I always allowed for that, but it kept comfortably returning to the people at LSU and the commitment I have made."

Family, Miles said, played a big part -- especially his wife, Kathy, a Michigan native whom Miles said "shed tears over this."

"Every one of my children is so happy here and enjoys being here with their friends and their other things," he said. "That's not something that necessarily can be replaced."

In the end, though, Miles said, it was realizing that LSU was where he wanted to be.

"It's not about the accomplishments; it's really about the team and the people I work with," he said. ""This is home to us. Staying at LSU was the right thing to do."